


Don't Want to Be Your Hero

by smallorbits



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Actors, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-29
Updated: 2019-04-29
Packaged: 2020-02-09 18:54:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18644080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smallorbits/pseuds/smallorbits
Summary: Jongin has trouble keeping a grasp on reality and Chanyeol is the lightest anchor ever.





	Don't Want to Be Your Hero

**Author's Note:**

> after almost one year of not writing a word, here i am with my one true love ~chankai~   
> honestly this fic was almost entirely written on my phone across a dozen red eye flights, so thank my inability to sleep on flights ig

Today, Jongin has his gun tucked discreetly under the lapel of his suit. The age old joke about guns in his pockets is on the tip of his tongue but now is not the time for cheap laughs, not when he's hunched over a tall table at a cocktail party with his head lowered just enough to remain inconspicuous but not draw suspicion. He catches his partner's eyes across the ballroom and at the nod he receives, Jongin casually sets his champagne flute down and slips into the crowd.

He's out of the hotel and blending into the darkness of the streets in no time, street lamps casting shadows that dance across his face.

The place is Milan, the time just past midnight.

"Is that a gun in your pocket or are you too eager to see me?" his partner jokes, appearing by his side soundlessly with feline grace, and the tension bleeds out of the moment like a deflating balloon. Jongin swallows the laughter bubbling in his throat and raises his eyebrows. Baekhyun always did know how to read his mind.

"Cut," the director yells, grimacing his face in annoyance. "I told you to stop with the adlibs."

Baekhyun shrugs, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "You cut off the scene before the camera panned to me anyway."

Suddenly, Jongin is in a studio in Seoul, the streetlights fading out into a green screen.

Life isn't a superhero movie, but if Jongin had a superpower, his would be teleportation.

  
  
  
  


Jongin doesn't know how to make sense of his life, so he gets lost in the world others write for him.

At 25, what the media always calls the age of brilliance, Jongin is drifting. He came from years as a child actor but managed to shed that image behind with an early enlistment in the army. Two years of military training has shaved away the baby fat on his cheeks and given him the razor sharp jawline that girls fawned over now.

Once upon a time, Jongin had a semblance of a normal childhood, but when he tries to sort out the pieces of his youth, all the memories are mixed in with the numerous youth dramas he did. He doesn’t remember if the time he tore his pants playing football was with his actual classmates, or with a ragtag team of child actors. This world of caged in wooden sets and reciting lines off scripts is all he knows.

When Jongin was in high school, he used to take photography. It was either that or home economics and he wasn't too eager to risk accidentally burning down the school.

He had an old camera passed down from his sister, a loyal canon, and he spent many days indulging in the luxury of digital photography.

Under the guidance of not his teacher but the camera men he meets on set, he learned to tweak the colour balance of a photograph and change the settings to suit whatever mood he needed - indoor, dark, macro, focused.

Onscreen, he changes his personality like that too - slick grins and smooth skin one moment, a hesitant sigh and a soft smile the next.

Just give him a script and Jongin can become anything.

  
  
  
  


This time, Jongin is dressed in scrubs. He pulls at the mask hanging loosely around his neck, hating the suffocating scratchy fabric that has covered his face for half of this shoot. He doesn't know how actual surgeons do it and for their sake, he sure hopes real masks are more comfortable.

They just came out of a 12 hour heart transplant surgery and Jongin needs to look the part, suitably exhausted but still hopeful. After all, he won't know that the heart he just sewed up belonged to his ex-girlfriend until episode 8.

Acting skills aren't required to fake exhaustion when Jongin sleeps two hours a day on this live filming schedule. Across the dressing room, his female lead, Soojung is slumped elegantly across the makeup table, catching up on her beauty sleep. She's always so frail-looking when she sleeps, a world away from the strong defiant glare she gives whenever anyone dares to suggest that she take a break.

"Mr. Kim?"

He opens his eyes and startles to see a bloody eye dangling from the forehead of the man peering at him.

The man laughs, a loud guffaw that rings too loud in the dressing room and grates on Jongin's nerves. "I'm Chanyeol, your makeup artist for the week."Hhe turns the fake eye over in his palm and closes his long fingers around the eerie prop. "I used to do haunted houses." The way he phrases the sentence seems like he's waiting for Jongin to prompt him for more explanations but Jongin doesn't take the bait.

"Where's Yixing?" Jongin asks, ignoring the slight pout that comes onto Chanyeol's face. If he hadn't introduced himself as the make up artist, Jongin would have dismissed him as one of the pretty extras that flit on and off the set. Make up artists tend to be bland themselves, choosing to forgo styling themselves up despite their expertise. Chanyeol is boyishly handsome, with defined features and large eyes that wouldn’t seem out of place in a boyband. A face like that should be on camera not behind it.

"Yixing twisted his ankle. Fell from the bar top. Long story," Chanyeol says dismissively. From his tone, he's clearly good friends with Yixing.

"Hmm," Jongin offers, not wishing to continue the conversation any longer. All he wants to do is to catch up on sleep while he can, as futile as it may be.

"You gunning for that Dracula?" Chanyeol jokes after a quick once over of Jongin's face. "Pale skin, bloodshot eyes." He gestures at the spread of eyeshadow on the table and tilts his head. "Would you like a trickle of blood down the side of your mouth to complete the look? Maybe a few sparkles?"

At Jongin's blank stare, Chanyeol sighs and picks up a tube of concealer. "Not much for conversation, huh? Don't worry, pretty boy, no blood this time."

Jongin can’t wait for Yixing’s leg to be healed.

  
  
  
  


A week later, Chanyeol is still there.

Jongin doesn't do friendships, something that his manager, Junmyeon calls him out on all the time. Connections are important in this industry, hearsay even more so. No one wants to work with a difficult actor.

Jongin is slow to warm to strangers, and it’s taken months for him to even develop the fragile friendship he had with Yixing and the rest of the staff.

Apparently Chanyeol didn’t get the memo. He seems determined to befriend Jongin, pushing on despite Jongin’s often half-hearted replies.

"So what do you do in your free time?" Chanyeol asks while putting the finishing touches on Jongin’s lips.

Jongin’s smacks his lips together, smudging in the gloss and drawing a small sigh of frustration from Chanyeol about his ruined work. “I don’t have free time.”

“How can you not have free time?” Chanyeol asks, narrowly missing drawing a streak of lip gloss up Jongin’s cheeks.

“I film 7 days a week,” Jongin says tiredly. “You should know, you’re my makeup artist.”

“Your makeup artist?” Chanyeol repeats, seemingly delighted at Jongin’s acceptance of him as a member of the crew.

“I heard from Junmyeon that you’ve replaced Yixing.”

“Yeah, Yixing is on bed rest for at least another week and the filming schedule is too tight, so I’m here.” Chanyeol beams at Jongin like he expects an answer, so Jongin thins his lips again, refusing to entertain him.

It doesn’t deter Chanyeol and he continues to dab powder on Jongin’s face. "After we finish the scenes today, wanna hang?"

Taken back by the sudden request, Jongin takes a moment to reply. "hang?"

Chanyeol laughs at first, thinking Jongin is just joking but when the silence drags into uncomfortable territory, he explains incredulously, "Like i don't know, grab pizza, play video games?"

"We don't have time to," Jongin snaps defensively. “Hang.”

"Ooo, calling yourself 'we' now. Alright your Highness, this humble subject requests a few moments of your precious time."

Somehow, Jongin feels defiant enough to agree. Much later when everyone is bowing and calling out words of thanks and encouragement, Chanyeol siddles up to his side and nudges him gently. “Hey, my car’s in basement two.”

Jongin shoots a look at Junmyeon, hoping his manager would save him from this unintended social situation, but Junmyeon only encourages it, all but pushing Jongin into Chanyeol’s car after Chanyeol promises to bring Jongin back home by midnight.

“So cute,” Chanyeol coos, jiggling his car keys in his pocket. “Cinderella has a curfew.”

By then, Jongin is too tired to resist and lets himself be whisked away.

  
  


 

 

“Excuse the mess,” Chanyeol says cheerfully as he opens the door and casually kicks off his shoes. One of his sneakers flies under the shoe rack, filled messily with shoes of every colour.

It’s so homely and lived in, a world of difference from the pristine studio Jongin calls his home.

Jongin is starting to grasp how Chanyeol is like from the way his apartment is laid out - colourful throw pillows that don’t match strewn across the couch, pictures of smiling people on every wall.

“Do you like video games?”

“Which ones?” Jongin doesn’t want to admit that he’s barely even played multiplayer games because he never had much of a chance to.

Chanyeol proudly pulls open a closet to reveal an entire wall of games packed tightly. “Which one do you want to play?”

Jongin doesn’t recognise most of the titles, so he feigns interest in all of them. “Which one is your favourite?”

  
  
  
  


Jongin's character dies again. He's a hairline of patience away from throwing his controller at the screen when Chanyeol takes the controller away from him.

“I was just about to win,” Jongin protests, despite the fact that he lost every single game to Chanyeol, even with Chanyeol’s patient coaching.

“It’s late,” Chanyeol says gently, and Jongin scrambles for his phone to look at the time.

Junmyeon sent him a text at one am asking him where he was, two more missed calls around two am, and then a final text asking him to be safe. They’ve been playing games for four hours now.

“We should do this again.” Chanyeol’s smile reaches his eyes even as tiredness seeps into his face. “I’ll drive you home.”

Jongin wants to protest but he only just realises how tired he is. As Chanyeol bundles him up in his layers of clothing and ushers him out the door, Jongin distantly wonders if Chanyeol was the oldest child or if caring for others just comes naturally to him. He files a note to ask and falls asleep in the passenger seat of Chanyeol’s car before they even pull out of the parking lot.

  
  
  


 

The end of every day is always loud as the staff call out to each other, thanking the team for another day’s good work. There’s claps on the back and good natured ribbing, and everyone breaks off into little groups to go for a dinner or snack.

Jongin tunes them all out, biting on a hang nail and focusing on his script instead. There’s something about the lines in his next scene that seems off, like he doesn’t quite grasp the mood the writer is getting at. Should he aim for pensive, or sad?

“Jongin, are you coming?” Chanyeol calls out, interrupting his inner monologue,  and everyone freezes, the studio suddenly all too quiet.

Jongin never goes to company dinners. He’s worked with the same group of staff members since he was a child and they never brought him along because he was a minor who shouldn’t be exposed to the vices of alcohol and smokes. He didn’t pick up drinking even after he grew older, not liking the way alcohol tastes, and everyone just accepted it to be part of Jongin's squeaky clean image.

Chanyeol grins at him, one hand on the door and cocks his head.

“Yeah,” Jongin says, acutely aware of his camera director widening his eyes. He places his script in his bag and nods. “Yeah, okay.”

  
  


 

 

Jongin feels like a child at the adult table. He knows how it goes, has played the part in a few career-focused dramas, but somehow now that he’s actually here, it all feels foreign.

Chanyeol places a hand on Jongin’s knee and squeezes it, sensing Jongin’s uncomfortableness.

The atmosphere was awkward when they first sat down, Jongin’s presence tipping the usual balance. The rest of the staff weren’t sure how to act with Jongin there, but a few rounds of soju has loosened them all up and everyone melts easily into their usual conversations, almost forgetting that Jongin is there.

“Hanging in alright there?” Chanyeol murmurs, placing a piece of grilled pork belly on Jongin’s plate. They both know Jongin is on a strict diet but Jongin has come to learn that Chanyeol hates the idea of diets, especially, in Chanyeol’s own words, for some already perfect looking like Jongin.

“Thanks for inviting me out tonight.” Three soju bombs in and Jongin is already feeling it in his head, the alcohol relaxing him enough that he laces his fingers through Chanyeol’s hand and squeezes back.

Chanyeol looks at their joined hands in surprise and the softest smile slips onto his face. “You’re a lightweight!”

Jongin finds himself smiling back at Chanyeol’s delight. “They kept drinking in my honour. I drank along with them.”

“If anyone else asks you to drink, I’ll be your black knight,” Chanyeol promises, and he doesn’t make a move to take his hand back.

They smile at each other for a beat, Jongin’s mind a haze, until Chanyeol’s grin widens and he finally moves his hand away.

“Let me teach you how to make the perfect soju bomb. Did you know there’s a golden ratio?”

  
  
  
  


Jongin is what the critics like to call an immersive character.

For long months, Jongin _is_ the character.

One critic once said that she met him in real life and found nothing remarkable about him, no ounce of personality when stripped of the characters he slips into like a second skin.

Maybe that's why Jongin's characters are so believable, she concluded, because it's easier to paint on a blank canvas.

It's not until he meets Chanyeol that he realises just how boring he is. Somehow their one off meetup has turned into a weekly thing, much to the delight of Junmyeon, who’s always going on about how Jongin needs more friends.

Jongin is lured to Chanyeol’s home one Saturday with the promise of a One Piece marathon. With filming wrapping up soon and the story moving to focus on the development of two minor character’s romance, he finally has time to relax more.

It’s nice to lie around and do nothing for a whole afternoon, lying next to Chanyeol on his large king sized bed and flipping through yet another manga volume.

Chanyeol rolls over onto his side and props his head up with an arm to watch Jongin thumb through the pages.

“Having fun?”

“Mmhmm.” Jongin doesn’t even spare Chanyeol a glance, though he can feel his face growing warmer under the heat of Chanyeol’s gaze. Jongin’s job is to be watched but Chanyeol always makes him feel off kilter, like he’s a naughty schoolboy who snuck out of class and is trying not to be caught.

"Not doing anything is your idea of a good time?" Chanyeol teases.

"I'm one of south korea's most popular actors," Jongin grumbles, shooting an arm out to shove Chanyeol’s shoulder.

"And yet you have no one to hang out with except for the stand in makeup artist," Chanyeol jeers back. It catches Jongin harder than he expects and even the years of acting can't stop Jongin from furrowing his forehead.

Chanyeol, ever so perceptive, mirrors the frown. He rolls closer, until their shoulders bump. "Hey, I meant that as a joke, princess. You're not bad company."

"You're not bad company yourself," Jongin allows, feeling pleased despite himself. He’s immediately placated by Chanyeol’s compliments, eager for validation like some puppy.

Chanyeol beams at him and sticks his hand in his pocket to jiggle the coins in them. "There’s an arcade down the block. Mr. Hot Shot Actor, do you want to show me how good you are at balls?"

  
  
  


Jongin is terrible at basketball, to no one's surprise. At one point, Chanyeol stops to watch Jongin throw futilely at the net, revelling in Jongin's increasing frustration at Chanyeol's attempts to tease him.

"These are not the kind of balls I'm used to playing with," Jongin finally says, channeling every suave spy romance movie hero he's ever played and feeling a surge of satisfaction when he leaves Chanyeol speechless for the first time.  
  


 

 

 

Chanyeol smokes. Jongin has smelled whiffs of it on him whenever they play games together, and most of the staff duck out for smoke breaks in between takes, a bonding ritual of sorts.

Jongin has kissed actresses who smoked and found he didn’t always mind the acrid taste leftover in their mouths. He idly wonders if Chanyeol tastes the same.

He waits in Chanyeol’s car while Chanyeol takes a quick smoke break. They’re heading off to Chanyeol’s place to dig into takeaway chicken and maybe some beer. It was almost 9pm by the time filming wrapped up for the day and Jongin whined about being too bored to go home by himself, ignoring Junmyeon’s knowing smiles.

“Thanks for making my job easier,” Junmyeon had joked with Chanyeol, and Chanyeol sent him a one finger salute and demanded a cut of his pay.

Jongin is fiddling with the radio when Chanyeol gets back into the car.

“Hey, keep it on that station. I like this song.”

Ever since they started hanging out together, Jongin’s exposure to music has widened immensely. He recognises the song as HONNE’s Feels So Good and names it outloud, earning a smile of Chanyeol’s approval that settles deep in his toes.

The road back to Chanyeol’s apartment takes them past the rowdier part of Sinchon and at a stop light, a group of drunk college kids stumble past the road, one of them waving at the car.

For a moment, Jongin thinks he’s been recognised and pulls his scarf around his face tighter, but soon realises that it was just drunk antics.

Chanyeol chuckles, fingers tapping a beat on his steering wheel. “Takes me back.” Jongin hums a reply and Chanyeol glances at him. "You ever been clubbing in Hongdae?"

“Um,” Jongin gestures at his face. “Child actor turned nation’s darling?”

"You're not as famous as you think you are, Kaii," Chanyeol scoffs. The way he says Jongin’s onscreen moniker sounds like an insult, and Jongin hates it.

Except Jongin is Asia's First Love. His face is plastered all along the line two subway stations. He has fans ranging from elementary school kids to grandmothers in marts.

Today, Jongin doesn't feel like anyone's first love; he just feels like a 25 year old man who's a little bitter about losing out on life's experiences.

Chanyeol launches into a story of when he lost a shoe in a club once and Jongin is amused enough that he forgets about self pity, choosing to wash his insecurities away with muffled giggles.

 

 

 

 

Except Chanyeol hasn’t dropped the topic because the minute they step into the apartment, Chanyeol pushes Jongin onto the couch.

"It’s halloween weekend.” Chanyeol holds up his phone and shows the instagram posting by a popular club. "And I'm a makeup artist."

He disappears into his room and comes out again with a couple of outfits in his arms. “Wait, here, I have this.”

Jongin immediately recognises it as the scrubs he wears on set, the same scratchy material and unflattering shade of green. "Is this actually my set uniform?"

"Of course not," Chanyeol says with a grin. "This is Woohyun's. I’m going to wear yours."

Somehow Jongin gets talked into changing into doctor gowns, and he stands next to Chanyeol in front of the full length mirror, noticing for the first time the height difference between them. Woohyun is slightly shorter than he is so the sleeves cut off at a weird length, but nothing compares to how short Jongin’s own gown looks on Chanyeol.

“I look ridiculous,” Chanyeol laughs so hard his left eye scrunches up. “this material is scratchy. We really need to feedback to the costume design team.”

“You’ll get used to it. You're not supposed to wear the doctor's gown out of the workplace," Jongin says lightly, pulling on his uniform to smooth out the creases.

"Wherever you are is my workplace," Chanyeol says, and for some reason, that makes Jongin tense up, reminded that Chanyeol works for him in a way.

He doesn’t have time to dwell on those thoughts because Chanyeol is approaching with his makeup tools in his hand, ready to transform Jongin into just another unrecognisable doctor. "Come on doc, let's go play."

  
  
  
  


 

Halloween night means that the streets of Hongdae are filled with ghosts and vampires and sexy kittens.

It took a good twenty minutes before Jongin realises no one could possibly recognise him under the layers of makeup that Chanyeol has lathered on him.

Chanyeol is a good makeup artist and his years of working in haunted houses certainly helped. Every once in a while, Chanyeol would lunge at some passerbys with a growl, delighting in their surprise.

Jongin feels bold enough to even indulge when someone asks to take a photo with them, marveling at the realistic bloody makeup.

For the first time ever, Jongin is free to roam the streets and experience absolute invisibility. 

“I feel like Harry Potter wearing an invisibility cloak,” he yells at Chanyeol when they’re packed into a noisy club, Chanyeol wriggling next to him in a poor imitation of dance.

  
“Nah, you’re more like Hermione, cute uptight little thing.”

Jongin frowns at Chanyeol and suddenly does a body roll against him, finishing with a slutdrop that has Chanyeol’s mouth dropping open. One of his roles had him as an aspiring idol trainee, and those late night dance lessons sometimes got interesting.

Chanyeol holds his palms up in front of him in defeat. “Alright, alright, princess. No one here is uptight.”

Jongin laughs and presses himself back into Chanyeol’s space, urging him to dance along. Luckily Chanyeol has almost no shame, and they attract quite an audience cheering along the two silly, inappropriate doctors on the dance floor.

  
  
  
  


“Dispatch will have a field day if they caught me out here like this,” Jongin muses once they’ve danced themselves silly and settled in a smaller speakeasy on a hidden alleyway, swirling his soju glass in one hand. “But maybe the public would lick it up. Makes me seem more human or something.”

Chanyeol sighs and props his chin up with an arm, watching Jongin with a lopsided grin. “You’re so lucky you’re on a date with a makeup artist. I got the bad end of the deal, one whiny superstar.”

Jongin almost spills the soju in his hand and it takes all of his years of acting experience to not display the shock on his face. Chanyeol looks a bit panicked, obviously not meaning to say it out loud. “Is this a date?”

“If you want it to be.” Chanyeol smiles back, but there’s a hint of nervousness in his voice.

The night is thrumming with energy, the streets full of youths out for a good time. Jongin has never felt more free, and it’s all thanks to Chanyeol.

Bravado swells in his chest and Jongin laces their hands together, biting back his smile at how flustered Chanyeol looks. ”Help me retrace my lost memories, lover boy.”

Chanyeol’s responding grin is all he needs.

  
  
  


 

The music is still pounding in Jongin’s ears hours later, after they’ve sobered up. Chanyeol stayed responsible and only had one drink early on in the night, and he insists on walking Jongin up to his apartment, cooing about how Jongin is tipsy even with half a bottle of soju.

“I had fun today,” Jongin says softly.

Chanyeol holds Jongin by his shoulders and leans in close to peer at his still made up face, laughing when Jongin playfully struggles away. “Look at my masterpiece. I still have it in me.”

“Do you want-“ Jongin darts out his hand to grab Chanyeol’s. “Coffee?” 

“Coffee?”

“Sorry, it was the first thing i thought of.” Jongin snatches his hand back and mumbles, both of them knowing well that Jongin doesn’t even drink coffee. He only started stocking some cheap instant mixes when Chanyeol started coming over more, though he insists it’s for Junmyeon and other guests.

“Of course.”

 

 

 

They go to each other’s houses all the time, but today it feels different.

“Do you actually want coffee?” Jongin asks awkwardly once they’ve toed off their shoes.

Chanyeol flops down on the couch and pats the space next to him. “No, just want you here next to me.”

Jongin hurries to comply, not even able to look Chanyeol in the eye. The possibilities and worries fly through his head, and not even his track record of teenage romance prince has prepared him for a moment like this.

"You're quiet."

Chanyeol’s touch is careful and Jongin cranes his head up automatically, letting Chanyeol trace his lips with his thumb.

“You’re so pretty,” Chanyeol says, hushed and careful. 

"I'll smudge my makeup," Jongin murmurs, feeling the heat in his cheeks and a similar warmth pooling in his stomach.

Chanyeol’s voice drops, and it sends shivers down Jongin’s spine. "You won't, because I'll be the one smudging it for you."

 

 

They lunge for each other at almost the same time, Jongin’s fingers curling around the the lapels of Chanyeol’s coat and pulling him closer, just as Chanyeol dips his head to press their lips together in a clash of a kiss.

Jongin has kissed a lot of people but this feels different.

Jongin expects sloppy but he's surprised because Chanyeol kisses just like his personality, warm and eager. His hands move everywhere, almost distracting Jongin from the kiss before a particularly hard nip on his lips draws a moan from Jongin.

Chanyeol’s hands slip down Jongin’s back, pulling him onto his lap and groping his ass.

It makes Jongin hesitate only the briefest of moments, but Chanyeol picks it up. Of course he does, when Chanyeol seems to know him better than Jongin knows himself, seems to be attuned enough to Jongin that he has a snack in his hands before Jongin even realises he's hungry.

"Is this-" Chanyeol licks his lips and Jongin's eyes follow, completely transfixed by the sheen it leaves. "Your first time?"

Jongin thinks of all the times he made love in character, the nipple pasties and exaggerated moans. Sometimes even more, hands slipping past breast and thigh, and all Jongin could think about wasn't her hands tangled in his hair, but how he hadn't gotten hard even once, couldn’t have had under the glare of the studio lights and the gaze of 50 other staff members in the room.

"Yes," he says.

“We’ll take things at your pace,” Chanyeol promises, hands already straying back over his ass.

This time Chanyeol kisses him like he's precious, soft and almost loving. His eyes too say more than Jongin has ever experienced, nothing he has seen from even the most talented actress. It's different than the loud, confident image Chanyeol puts up, but Jongin likes it. He hates vulnerability usually, but somehow falling apart in Chanyeol’s arms like this makes him feel alive.

Chanyeol’s hands find its way under Jongin’s shirt and Jongin doesn’t even wait for the question before he shrugs his coat and top off, then tugs at Chanyeol’s.

And oh, Chanyeol is a talker. He murmurs encouragements, and Jongin laps it all up, grinding down on Chanyeol’s crotch just as enthusiastically, until it all builds and builds, and Jongin feels high on adrenaline.

“Wait, wait, Jongin-” Chanyeol pulls away, leaving Jongin chasing after him. 

“Why’d you stop,” Jongin says accusingly, feeling petulant enough to pout, annoyed that he finally had Chanyeol’s lips and touch on him only to have it taken away .

“I didn’t know if you wanted to take it further,” Chanyeol says sheepishly. “I don’t want to push you, so maybe we should take it slow.”

Of course Chanyeol would putting feelings into making love - and Chanyeol wouldn't call it anything else but "making love", would make it all emotional and meaningful, things Jongin tries to actively avoid.

Chanyeol probably thinks that sex is precious and is like giving a part of you away, a piece of your heart.

Jongin isn't giving himself away to anyone.

“Okay, let’s take it slow.”

Jongin thinks about his crumbling walls and then Chanyeol nips on the groove of his collarbone, scraping his teeth hard enough that Jongin will bruise tomorrow, and Jongin doesn't think at all.

  
  
  
  
  


"I told you to be careful," Chanyeol tsks as he swipes concealer on the bruises near Jongin’s waist. "Always making my job so hard."

The director leans over and examines the discolouration, poking his finger into one and making Jongin wince. "Must be that rope scene. I’m going to tell the assistant to check the harness."

Jongin meets Chanyeol's mirth filled eyes in the mirror and tries to look as stern as possible. Chanyeol only winks back in return, and it’s enough to make Jongin’s heart leap into his throat.

Jongin doesn't give himself away to anyone but somehow, Chanyeol can take all he wants.


End file.
